MEGA DRIVE

 

Catalog Spec

Developer	SEGA
Release date in Japan	October 1988
Media	ROM cartridge / CD-ROM
CPU	Main CPU: MOTROLA MC68000 (7.67MHz/NTSC, 7.60MHz/PAL) Sub CPU: Z80A (3.58MHz/NTSC, 3.54MHz/PAL)
VDP (Video Display Processor)	YAMAHA’s 315-5313 customized for MEGA DRIVE NTSC: 320 or 256 * 224 lines (vertical 448 lines available in interlace) PAL: 320 or 256 * 240 lines (vertical 480 lines available in interlace)
RAM	Main memory (for MC68000): 64KB Sub memory (for Z80S): 8KB
VRAM	Dual port DRAM 64KB (32KB*2)
Sound	Digital tone generator 4ch stereo (waveform memory tone generator, 1ch is available for PCM tone generator) YM2612 (OPN2 7.67MHz) with FM synthesis 6 channels
List price in Japan	21,000 yen

MEGA DRIVE is a SEGA’s videogame console released in 1989. This console was released as “SEGA GENESIS” in North American region including the United States, Canada and Mexico. This was developed as the successive machine of SEGA Mark III and competed with NINTENDO’s SUPER FAMICOM (known as “SUPER NINTENDO ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM”, so called “SNES”) and NEC’s PC ENGINE in Japanese market in 1990s. SEGA focused on the feature that it was 16 bit machine as a selling point to carry out the sales promotion. Although this console couldn’t win NINTENDO in Japanese market, it became the first hardware to sell 1 million units in Japan. It could achieve some success and it was the second-highest-selling home gaming console after SEGA SATURN. In the global market including the United State and Brazil, SEGA also won some success. In the U.S., SEGA local corporation positively focused on the localization. The headquarters understood it was better and necessary that the American staffs developed the original titles for American consumers. For example, SEGA US could license agreements with world-famous celebs such as Joe Montana (American football player),  Ayrton Senna (F1 racing driver), Michale Jackson etc, the title featuring them could achieve succeess commercially. In Brazil, a Brazilian electronics company TECTOY manufactured and distributed MEGA DRIVE in the country’s market instead of SEGA due to the reason that Brazil government lays the high tax on the imported precision apparatus including gaming console. TECTOY could provide the domestic consumers the console in the reasonable price range as well as SEGA Mark III. Even though SEGA stopped the business to manufacture its gaming console in 2001, TECTOY has continued to manufacture both of the consoles. As on 2012 TECTOY sold 120,000 units including SEGA Mark III and MEGA DRIVE, the company kept the steady sales volume. Plus, the company releases the new MD console which had the built-in titles inside it and the ROM cartridge couldn’t be inserted. The new version of this build-in type MD was released in 2016. MEGA DRIVE’s medias are ROM cartridge and CD-ROM mainly. And for ROM cartridge, the ROMs of SEGA Mark III are available in MD in the condition that an external converter MEGA ADAPTER is installed. This converter was released because SEGA resolved the lack of MEGA DRIVE title ROM cartridges at the early times of the console sales. moreover, SUPER 32X was released in 1994. It enable to play its own titles in 32 bit circumstances.